


Extremis

by MachaSWicket



Category: Arrow (TV 2012)
Genre: F/M, and does not exceed what we've seen on the show, the violence is less graphic than possibly not great for the squeamish
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-27
Updated: 2015-07-27
Packaged: 2018-04-11 14:23:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4438865
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MachaSWicket/pseuds/MachaSWicket
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>SUMMARY:  So the lovely dettiot got an anonymous prompt on tumblr wondering what would happen if Oliver had to hurt Felicity like he hurt Thea on the island -- in order to get them out of a dangerous situation. And I'm a masochist to my favorites, so here we are!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Extremis

**Author's Note:**

> THANKS to dettiot for letting me steal [the prompt](http://machawicket.tumblr.com/post/125048980347/for-some-reason-i-saw-a-gif-of-oliver-and-thea) in the first place! And to my fellow masochists/angstwhores on tumblr who were weirdly excited to read this. ;)

 

“Please, Felicity.  _Please_  wake up.”

His pained, desperate voice is what finally pulls her to consciousness. Well, sort of. Groggy, sluggish consciousness at best. Her head feels like it’s stuffed with cotton.

With a groan, Felicity tries to move, to roll over, to relieve the pressure on her shoulders because she’s lying on her side, but with her arm  _behind_  her? And her shoulder is  _aching_ , and there’s what sounds like the drone of an engine and is she lying on the floor of a train car? What...?

“Oliver,” she says, her voice sounding slurred even to her own ears, “what–-?”

“Thank God, Felicity,” he says, and he sounds  _terrible_. She tries to peel her eyes open. “Felicity, please come here.”

“What happened?” she asks. Her eyes blink open, but nothing really changes -– wherever they are, it’s dark. Her head is still fuzzy, her thoughts still weirdly muted, and she thinks she must’ve been drugged. She moves to roll over onto her front, push herself up, and only realizes her hands are restrained behind her back when her wrists tug painfully against metal cuffs and she lands on her stomach with an  _oof_. 

The resulting hit of adrenaline slices right through the fog and she tilts her chin toward her chest and rests her forehead on the grimy floor of...  _wherever_  they are. She’s handcuffed, and suddenly very aware of her surroundings as she turns her head in his direction.

There’s  _so_ little light that she can’t really get a sense of how large the space is, but they’re definitely in motion. So maybe a train car? Or a truck? She’s handcuffed on the (dirty, gritty) floor, and Oliver is sitting several feet away, leaning up against the wall. 

“We’re in the back of a tractor-trailer,” Oliver explains, his voice tight with tension. “We were drugged. You’ve been out-– It’s been a while.”

God, he sounds awful. She’s only ever really heard him this stressed, this pushed past his limits when Thea is in danger. And he’s still not moving towards her. It’s that realization that gets her -– because he’d be hovering over her if he could. She would've woken up cradled carefully in his arms. “Are you hurt?” she asks.

He shakes his head. “I’m fine,” he says, and she knows he’s lying. “But I’m cuffed to this fucking wall.”

Oh. That makes sense. She rolls onto her hip and curls her knees up, awkwardly pushing herself up to a sitting position. She hasn’t been restrained like this since Helena three years back, and she’s only marginally less uncoordinated trying to right herself.

She ends up cross-legged, her skirt hiking very far up her legs, and her bare ankles grinding a little against the floor. Even worse, the arm she’d been lying on is going all pins-and-needles on her, which makes her hiss in discomfort.

“Please, Felicity,” Oliver implores, his voice still a little shaky with raw emotion. “Come closer.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?” she asks, even as she moves, rolling up onto her knees and scooching to his side. It hurts and it’s awkward, but she ends up with her knees against the wall, thigh pressed against his so she can try to see him. But her glasses are missing and it’s  _really_  dark, so the details are lost to her. He leans into her, pressing his face against her neck with a shuddering exhale. “Oliver?”

“You weren’t moving, and it’s too dark and too fucking loud in here for me to be sure you were–-” His words choke to a stop.

To be sure she was breathing. To be sure she was alive.  _Oh, Oliver._

Felicity leans her chin against his temple, and goddammit, she would really like to be able to wrap her arms around him right now. And to have his comforting arms around her. Stupid handcuffs. “I’m okay,” she reassures him. “Just groggy.”

Oliver nods against her, kissing her collarbone twice before sitting back up. “Are you sure you’re not hurt?” She can’t see clearly enough to confirm, but she knows _Oliver_ , and she knows he’s examining her as closely as he can for any injuries.

When he finally looks back up to meet her gaze, she says, “I’m fine, Oliver,” and lets him read the honesty in her face.

A small measure of the tension in his body eases. “No phones,” he tell her. “Not sure how far outside of Starling we are, or whether anyone knows we’re gone.”

Oh. Right. They’d been out to dinner, leaving Team Arrow business to the others, and then... She frowns. That’s all she remembers. “I don’t remember anything past ordering the good Chianti.”

Oliver manages a genuine grin that’s bright in its happiness, even in the low light. “You liked it," he tells her.

She smiles back at him, wishing she could see him more clearly, then sobers. "And then -- did someone grab us at the restaurant?"

All of Oliver’s levity fades. "Parking lot, I think," he says. "I remember paying the check."

Felicity considers that, but there's not really much new information that is of any use to them at the moment. “Okay," she says, "so now what?”

“I can’t get free. I’ve tried." Oliver demonstrates by leaning forward and giving his bindings a tug. Then he winces.

"Oliver?"

"Cracked rib, maybe," he answers. "I'm fine. We just need to hope Dig and the team realized we were taken.”

Felicity frowns at him. Because that seems like a pretty passive plan for Oliver’s tastes. “Tell me how to free you and I’ll try.”

But he just shakes his head. “I’m trussed up at the elbows, Felicity. And cuffed to the wall. Separate sets of cuffs, split far enough apart that I can’t dislocate my thumb to get a hand free.”

Felicity winces for –- for a  _lot_  of reasons. Because that sounds incredibly uncomfortable, and also, his go-to plan is apparently dislocating his  _thumb._ “Wait,” she says slowly. “Can you–-” She stops, wrinkling her nose. She can’t  _believe_ she’s about to suggest this. “Can you dislocate my thumb?”

It’s so dark in the truck that she can’t be sure, but it  _looks_  like Oliver goes pale at the thought. His mouth drops open for a second, before he snaps, “Absolutely  _not_.”

If it weren’t for the damn cuffs, she’d be crossing her arms at him. “Do you have a better idea?”

“We wait for Dig,” Oliver repeats through gritted teeth.

“Oliver, what makes you think anyone even knows we were taken? We were taken as Oliver Queen and Felicity Smoak, not the Green Arrow and... well, whatever people might call the super genius  _behind_ the Green Arrow.”

“Felicity.”

“What? I could have a code name on the streets. You don’t know.”

“You don’t,” he snaps. “And I don’t want you to, for exactly  _this_  reason.”

Felicity frowns at him. “I can’t have a code name because I might get kidnapped in a situation that is completely unrelated to that code name?” she drawls, letting the idiocy of  _that_ argument stand on its own.

Oliver closes his eyes for a long moment, taking in a slow, even breath, and blowing it out before he responds. “You  _can’t_ be kidnapped, Felicity. I-–” He stops, shakes his head. “I need you to be safe.”

Felicity considers him –- the anguish on his face, the way his voice is shaking, the desperate way he’d curled into her when she’d reached his side. She softens. “I know, Oliver. So help me be safe.”

His brow furrows in confusion. “Felicity, I don’t–-” But he stops talking as soon as she moves, turning to face away from him, reaching her arms back until her fingers tangle with his. He holds her hand tightly, desperately. “What are you doing?”

“Dislocate my thumb,” she orders.

“Felicity,” he breathes.

“I don’t know how to do it myself, but if you do it, I can get out of the cuffs, right?” she insists, trying her best to keep her tone steady. It’s hard, though, because her idea (well, his idea bounced back onto her) sounds really painful. “Then I can work on getting you loose. And then we can  _get out of here_  and be safe.”

There’s a long beat of silence. “I can’t hurt you.”

Felicity leans back, using his arm to steady her, and turns her face to catch a glimpse of his profile. “You have to,” she answers quietly. “Oliver, please.”

“I  _can’t_ ,” he repeats, and his voice is so sad that she scoots around a little to see him. He keeps his chin down, averting his gaze. 

“You can,” she tells him firmly. “You have to. I trust you. And I would much rather ice my thumb than... deal with whatever happens when this truck stops and we’re still hog-tied and completely at the mercy of  _whoever_  is kidnapping us.”

“Felicity...”

Her frustration overtakes her a little bit, and she’s louder than she needs to be when she says, “Oliver, if you don’t do it, I’ll try. And I don’t know what I’m doing, so I’ll probably end up doing it  _wrong_  and, you know, thumbs aren’t quite as important for typing as the rest of my fingers, but the  _space bar_ can be–-”

A choked, rusty, wet sound interrupts her, and she turns further so she can see him more clearly. There’s barely any light in this stupid truck, but she can see the shimmer of tears on his cheeks. His eyes are watery when he meets her gaze and gives her a jerky nod. “Okay.”

Felicity freezes, just for a moment. “Okay?”

“I hate this,” he whispers, his grip on her fingers tightening even more.

She gives him as brave of a smile as she can manage. “I’m not  _super_  looking forward to this plan, either, Oliver, but it’s the best out of several crappy options.”

“Left hand?” he asks, and she nods, feeling the panic starting to spiral. “It’s going to swell up,” Oliver tells her. “As soon as I do it, pull your hand through the cuff.”

 _Oh, good, there’s the nausea_ , Felicity thinks. Her stomach threatens mutiny as Oliver carefully maneuvers her arms behind him. She has to turn away from him and scoot backwards, her shoulder blade resting against his bicep. Gently, he takes her left wrist in one hand and pulls her arm behind his back until he can get a good hold of her thumb with his other hand.

“Don’t tense up,” Oliver warns, and she actually laughs at that. “I’m serious, Felicity. It’ll only hurt for a minute, and then we’ll pop it back.” 

She’s pretty sure that if there were enough light in this cargo compartment, she’d be seeing black spots. “Okay,” she says, her voice shaking. She’s taking fast, shallow breaths, and she knows that’s a really bad idea, but her lungs are not really listening to logic what with all the fear-based adrenaline flooding her system at the moment.

“Felicity, I’m going to count to three, okay?” he says, and his voice is calmer than before. Soothing, even, and she knows he's doing his best to keep her calm. She makes herself focus on his familiar voice, on the firm pressure of his bicep against her back, and nods her understanding. “I love you, Felicity, and I’m going to get you out of here, and you can tell this story at our wedding, okay?”

Felicity’s eyes go very, very wide, and her body goes slack with surprise. Because, yeah, they’re together and happy, but-– “Our  _what_?”

“One,” Oliver counts, and then his grip on her wrist tightens and he pulls and–

“ _Holy shit,_ that hurts!” Felicity shouts. Her whole hand is throbbing and she wants to cradle it against her chest, but she can’t because –-  _handcuffs_. She’s pretty sure she’s whimpering or maybe cursing, but she can’t hear much of anything over _the blistering pain in her thumb_.

“Pull your hand free, Felicity,” Oliver orders. “Now.”

Clenching her jaw against the wave of excruciating pain as the metal cuff scrapes along her dislocated joint, she yanks her hand free, half-falling into Oliver as she curls her body protectively around her injured hand. She’s crying a little, which she regrets, because she knows he feels terrible for causing her this pain. 

“Felicity?” God, he sounds awful again. He’s pressing kisses to her shoulder blade, comforting her as best he can from his confined position. “Felicity,  _please_ , let me reset the joint. It’ll help with the pain.”

But it’ll hurt to  _do_ , she knows. It takes her a moment to gather her willpower enough to move, to twist to face him and let him touch her hand. “Okay,” she says, her voice quavering. “It’s okay, Oliver,” she tells him when she catches sight of the devastated look on his face. “Really. Just–- help?” 

Oliver’s fingers are gentle against her skin as he shifts her arm behind him again. “Felicity,” he murmurs. “Come here.”

She leans in, pressing a soft kiss to his lips, reiterating without words that she doesn’t blame him, and she loves him. As soon as she pulls away, he resets her thumb, and she's so thankful he didn't wait or count down or anything. Felicity leans her forehead against his shoulder, making herself breath in big, gulping breaths, her uninjured hand gripping a fistful of his sleeve. It still hurts -- _badly_ \-- but he's right that the sharp insistence dulled after he reset the joint. This,  _this_ , she can maybe handle 

“Okay,” she says after a few long moments to recover. “Okay.”

“Ice will help,” Oliver tells her. “As soon as we get out of here.”

Out of here. Right. Felicity sits up straighter, bringing her left hand close to lie flat against her stomach. The pressure helps, somehow, and she’s starting to be able to think clearly again. “Okay,” she says, shifting to face him fully, the stupid empty handcuff bouncing off of her leg as it dangles from her right wrist. “Let me just...” With her right hand, she reaches behind him to get a better sense of his bindings, since it’s too dark to just  _look_. 

There’s rope looped repeatedly around his elbows, pinning his arms close to his sides and keeping him from having any leverage. Also probably his arms hurt from being in such an awkward position for so long. She traces down each forearm to his hands. His wrists are cuffed to separate vertical support bars about a foot apart, and she tests each set of handcuffs, then tugs the support bars a little. They’re relatively thin, and Felicity thinks she might have at least an outside shot at getting him loose.

Now she just needs something to work with. Kicking off her high heels, she pushes to her feet. “Let me look around.”

“Be careful,” Oliver urges. “Look for anything that can be used as a weapon. Anything that might cut through these ropes.”

Felicity nods, even though he probably can’t see her very well in the near-total darkness. “Got it.” 

It’s a slow process, made more difficult by the way the truck sways, and her reluctance to use her left hand. Moving around the perimeter of cargo area, she keeps her right hand on the metal walls for balance. When she trips over a box tied down to the front corner, her bad hand flies out and slams into the wall to save her from a spill, and,  _God,_ that hurt.

Hissing, she drops to her knees, her injured hand against her stomach while she breathes through the pain.

"Felicity? Felicity!"

"I'm okay," she says, and her voice is only a little shaky. "Hit my bad hand, but it's fine." Refocusing on the larger problem, she tugs the box closer and explores it with her good hand. It’s -– it’s a  _toolbox_. With a bit of fumbling, she gets it unlatched and open. She can’t see well enough to discern what’s inside, so she walks her fingers through the compartments. 

Lots of screwdrivers in varying sizes, some weird implements she can’t quite identify, not being a carpenter herself, and something sharp that stings along the edge of her hand before -– jackpot. “Oliver!” she says, pulling the solid metal tool free of the box. “A wrench! A nice big one.”

She thinks maybe he laughs before answering, “Great. Use it as leverage on these bars.”

Felicity hurries back to his side, feeling increased pressure to make this work. To get him free. It’s difficult – the metal bars aren’t thick, but they’re strong, but she remembers enough about her physics class at MIT to know she needs to focus on compromising a joint. The wrench gives her added leverage, but it’s not  _that_  long, which means she’s mostly going to have to do this with her own strength. And one bum hand.

The thought gives her pause, and Oliver leans into her gently. "You can do this, Felicity."

She gives him a quick kiss on his cheekbone, even though she was aiming for his temple, and then slips the wrench behind the metal bar. With a groan, she grips with her left hand, too, ignoring the throbbing pain. She ends up bracing her bare feet against the wall of the truck, putting her whole body into it, but _finally_ the bar gives with a screech of protest, and Oliver’s right hand is free.

He groans when he shifts his arm, then twists away from the wall now the he's half-free. He turns his back to her. “Can you untie the ropes?”

This task, too, requires both hands, and she is going to need  _so much ice_  and also  _so much wine_  when they get home. Her dislocated-and-relocated thumb aches with each movement, but thankfully, the knots in this rope are not tied too tightly or too complicatedly. 

Finally, they loosen, and she unwinds the loops carefully, until Oliver pulls his right hand free, rolling his shoulder and hissing. 

“Okay?” she asks.

“Just stiff,” he answers, his warm palm landing on her knee, the dangling cuff cool against her skin. “Hand me the wrench?”

Felicity is happy to leave the freeing of his left hand to him, and is not at all surprised that it takes him (and his ridiculous strength levels) less than ten seconds to do what took her probably five minutes. Whatever. At least they are both fully unrestrained, even if, between the two of them, they have three pairs of cuffs dangling from their wrists.

Oliver takes a moment to work his arms in little circles, loosening his muscles, then turns to face her.

She gives him a smile. “What now?” The words are barely out of her mouth before he’s got those big, strong arms wrapped around her. “Oliver,” she says, her hands landing flat on his back, rubbing soothing patterns. “I’m okay. I promise.”

"Good," he whispers.

"Oh, your ribs!" Felicity eases her hold on him, but Oliver doesn't budge.

His arms tighten for just a moment, then he releases her. “Now let’s get the hell out of here.”

She grins. “Agreed.”

It doesn’t take Oliver long to pry open the roll-up door in the back of the truck. Felicity blinks against the sudden brightness of headlights behind them. When she can focus again, she can they’re on a main thoroughfare, though thankfully not a highway, and she can just make out the Starling City skyline in the distance. Felicity can also see stunned faces in the car just behind them –- she supposes it’s not every day the cargo truck in front of you opens to reveal kidnapping victims attempting an escape.

Beside her, Oliver waves the car closer, and Felicity stiffens beside him. “Oliver, what–?”

“Do you trust me?” he asks, his face half in shadows, half lit, all his focus on her. “I won’t let you get hurt, Felicity. I swear to you.”

“I know,” she agrees. “I trust you.”

Oliver glances out the door again, where the car behind them has crept very close to the truck, leaving only a couple foot gap. The driver, a very panicked-looking Southeast Asian woman, nods at them, clearly understanding Oliver’s insane jump-onto-the-hood-of-that-car plan.

“Are you ready?” he asks, gripping her good hand tightly in hers.

Felicity takes a big, gasping breath. “I’m ready.”

And they jump.

END

**Author's Note:**

> NOTE: I am entirely too squeamish to do much research on dislocated joints, and also I think the show’s insistence that Oliver can pop his thumb in and out of joint at will to escape handcuffs is probably bullshit, BUT IT’S CANON, SO OKAY. Now so can Felicity. ;)


End file.
